The Wedding Shrug

 

When my daughter got engaged in June, and as we were planning the wedding we were having one of the hottest summers on record. She picked out her "dream" dress with lace, and a beautiful strapless sweetheart neckline.   But the date of the wedding was October 20, I kept thinking that her beautiful strapless dress might be  a problem when the weather cooled down in October.  So I began researching and trying to find a pattern for a shrug that would have a beautiful lace design, and not cover up her beautiful dress.

I ended up putting together a pattern for stockings (Vogue magazine Spring/summer 2009) with a stockinette knit back, and then added a knitted lace edging at the sleeve and along the bottom of the back.  The yarn I used was Blue Skies Alpaca and Silk that I got at my LYS.  I was guessing that the color would work with the color of the dress (Ivory), as the dress didn't come in until late September.  Luckily, the color was perfect.  I also added pearl beads randomly throughout the knitted shrug to tie it in with her dress and the overall styling for the wedding.

 

It took a couple of restarts to get the sizing of the lace and sleeves right.  I was trying to make the shrug as a surprise for Kelly which meant I couldn't try it on her.  So it was mostly knitted by looking at some of her sweaters and crossing my fingers :>).  I ended up giving it to her 3 weeks or so before the wedding and did have to do some alterations to sleeve length, but otherwise it fit really well.  Whew!

 

 

Considering the temperatures ended up barely reaching 50 degrees that day, I think she was so glad to have the shrug.  And as you can see in the pictures it added some warmth for her arms and shoulders without covering up any of her dress.

 

 

 

And can I just say Kelly and Doug are so cute together.  The wedding ceremony was outdoors in a beautiful meadow surrounded by trees, and the reception was in a barn on the same property.  The wedding day was amazing.  And I have to thank the amazing photographers.  The first 3 pictures are by my friend Rissa, the rest of the photos are by Toni Price Photography.  Toni and Rissa did an amazing job.

 

And yes, we had quilts draped on some of the chairs in case guests were cold. 

 

Thanks for stopping by, Sylvia

 

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Random Christmas fun

My youngest daughter sent me this pic from the Meijer parking lot the other day.  She texted me "Mom, thought you would find this humorous"  and she was right.  I laughed out loud and still smile every time I see the picture.  I told my daughter I hope the driver noticed before she drove off.  She agreed but thought that would have been really funny to see the ball of yarn trailing behind the van...

Isn't this Christmas Tree skirt beautiful?  My daughter Alyssa made it!  She saw a picture of a similar one online and decided she could make that - one of those sometimes detrimental traits she learned from her mother :>)

She used a matelasse fabric she found at Joanns and then used osnaburg also from Joanns for the border.  She made a stencil and stenciled on the words.  The border also has silk ribbon stitching around the inner edge of the outer border.  I think it turned out beautifully.

My grandkids Ethan and Cora got to go on the Polar Express Christmas train with Mom and Dad.  Here is Ethan and Cora (at left) with Santa on the train.  They got to ride the train, had hot chocolate and cookies, and saw Santa and Mrs. Claus.  I think they had a really fun time.

This is a house and garage my grandson Ethan built.  I love the colorful symmetry with the block shapes. 

He also built this tower and bridge using legos and wood train tracks - so amazing!  Especially since he just turned 4, again totally symmetrical, he does have some OCD tendencies :>)  So we are on the hunt for fun building sets for him.  It seems all the Lego sets are to build a specific building or vehicle... just haven't found the right set for him.

 

This is a sneak peek at a surprise I Spy quilt for Ethan.  I intended to get this done for his birthday, but with all of the wedding stuff that didn't happen.  So, I am trying to get it done for Christmas.

 

OK, I think thats all for now.  Hope you enjoy my random Christmas post.  Hope you are having a joyous season, without too much stress.

Really Random

I am working on hand quilting a baby doll quilt for my grandaughter Cora.  This quilt was put together of left over tumblers from another project. 

It was fun just sewing these scraps together.  It is only 24" x 30" so I don't think it will take too long to quilt.

I used a soft flannel instead of batting so that the quilt would stay nice and soft and easy to use with her baby dolls.

This is the before and after of an armchair that I have been working on for a long time.  We aquired the chair a long time ago when my oldest daughter was in college.  She loved it cause it was small but super comfy - she still calls it her homework chair.  Then it got left in our garage, where I got big ideas about re-doing it. 

 I started tearing the old chair apart over a year ago, and then one project after another kept getting in the way of working on it.  Including my daughters engagement and wedding.

 

 So finally this last week I got a chance to get back at it and once I really started working on it and got out my husbands air stapler (high powered tools are always better :>)) the job went fairly quickly.

This is a pic of the chair all finished and in the room.  I have been re-doing this room, so I also just got the bookshelves all painted (they were unfinished pine to start out) and installed in the room.  Still have to get the rest of my books out of the basement.  But I am super happy with how the room is coming together.

And these two pics are close ups of a shrug that I knit for my daughter to wear with her wedding dress.  It is made of Alpaca and silk yarn and has pearl beads added in the knitting.  These pics were of the shrug as I blocked it.  The shrug is VERY soft and warm which was perfect as the wedding was outside and it was barely 50 degrees that day.

This is my daughter Kelly at the end of her wedding reception (and lots of dancing) with her new husband Doug.  You can see the shrug with the wedding dress.  Hopefully, I will get the photographer photos of the wedding soon, including some close ups of the shrug that I will post next week.  So please check back next week to see the finished shrug.

Thank you for stopping by to check out my random projects!!  Hope you are getting lots of projects done too.

4 patch wedding quilt

I finished this quilt back in early October, but with all of the wedding plans I never got the pictures of the finished quilt posted.  The wedding was October 20, it turned out beautifully and such a special celebration.  So I am finally beginning to get caught up, and decided it was time to get the finished quilt pics posted.

 This antique bowtie quilt that I got at an auction was the inspiration for the colors used in the 4 patch quilt.  We gave everyone at the bridal shower a block to write a sentiment or wish for Kelly and Doug, and the blocks were worked into the quilt.

We chose the colors of the borders to give the same feeling of the antique bowtie quilt.  We also used muslin for the binding, and backing like the antique quilt.

 This is a shot as I was quilting it.  It is straight line quilting along the diagonal of the 4 patch, both directions, giving it a diagonal grid just like the original bowtie quilt. 

The newlyweds are enjoying life together, and were thrilled with the quilt, and the good wishes included with it.

A shot of the quilt on my vintage childs chair, that my grandkids love.  The quilt is a nice lap size, 52" x 60", and I used a quilters dream batting so that after washing it has a really nice crinkly texture.

 

Sweet Favors

 

We have the favors done for the wedding guests.  They are small jars of honey.  The wedding is being held at an orchard and they produce honey, so we used their honey to make up these cute thank you gifts.

 

 

We started with huge 5 lb jars of honey!!  Oh my, the aroma of the honey was amazing and that beautiful amber color.  Kelly's fiance had been eyeing the honey since we had brought it home, and she had to keep warning him to stay out of it.  We ended up having this much left over so he will finally get to enjoy some of the honey.

 

 

We measured out the amount for each jar from a big bowl. 

 

 

 

Carefully filling and sealing each of the jars.  Then we added burlap covers on top.  This proved to be much more difficult than we imagined because the burlap was so stiff that it kept popping off the slippery lid!  We finally got a system with rubberbands worked out and then added the twine and label.  BTW, Kelly's sister Alyssa made all of the little favor tags.  She is really good at doing the computer layouts for all of our signs and tags.

 

Kelly's Dad even got into the project, helping with the rubberbands and twine.  He did not understand however why on earth the jars needed burlap covers on the lids Ha! Ha!

 

Overall, we are very happy with how they turned out.  We are down to 10 days till the wedding, and really stressing about the weather.  Hopefully it will warm up a bit.  Only a high of 50 today!

 

Thanks for visiting, hope you have a great day!

Really Random

 

I have been busy working on the wedding keepsake quilt for Kelly and Doug.  It's almost done, stay tuned for more pics of it completely finished.  I am doing straight line machine quilting on the diagonal of the pieced 4 patch blocks.  It will end up being a 1 1/4" diagonal grid.  I was able to just eyeball the diagonals of the piecing but had to mark the lines in the borders with chalk. 

 

 

 

My daughter Kelly and I were at Joann fabrics the other day and while standing in line to get fabric cut we overhear the lady in front of us say "I'm getting this fabric because my grandaughter wants to learn to sew and I don't have any fabric in my house..."  upon hearing this my daughter turned to me with a look of absolute astonishment on her face - no fabric in her house??!!  She grew up with fabric in closets, fabric in the playroom, fabric in the dining room, fabric in the sewing studio...

 

 

This is a chandelier we got at a flea market for $20.00, OK, it didn't look this good when we bought it - had random wires and candlelabra light bulbs and a bit of rust.  But we took all that off, primed and spray painted it and now it is sooooo cute.  We plan to use it hanging in a tree above where the Kelly and Doug's ceremony vows will take place.

 

 

This is my daughter painting it, we rigged up a way to hang it on an old rolling garment rack I had.  We completely covered it with old drop cloth sheets, so it was kind of a funny sight.

 

 

More wedding stuff.  These are napkin rings we made for the wedding.  They are wired 3" burlap ribbon that we glued pearl trimmed lace onto, and then cut and sewed into the napkin rings. 

 

 

Yesterday we spent all afternoon working to layout tablescapes for each table at the wedding.  It was fun but a little stressfull and we now have more shopping to do.  See the tealight candles?  Those are the battery powered type and it is so funny cause they are real enough looking that I caught myself being careful to pick it up because my brain told me it would be hot - but of course its not.

 

 

Turkeys!!!  Saw this truck the other day on the highway and had to snap a photo.   I'm pretty sure I know where they're headed.

 

 

This is the back of the truck as we followed it.  And I have to say not a very appetizing picture :>)!!

 

 

 

 

 

And finally to end all this randomness an amazing photo of my grandkids.  My oldest daughter and family had a photo shoot the other day and I just fell in love with this picture!  Ethan and Cora are 4 and 2 and quite a handful for Mom (and Dad),  but they sure do look sweet here!

 

Thanks for stopping by, have a good rest of your week!